Evangeline ; or, The Belle of Acadia (1874), a musical burlesque by J. Cheever Goodwin (book, lyrics), E. E. Rice (music). [ Niblo's Garden, 16 perf.] When her people are expelled by the British from their Acadian village, Evangeline (Ione Burke) and her lover Gabriel (Connie Thompson) are separated. Evangeline wanders the world, from the wilds of Africa to the wilder West, before she is reunited with her fiancé. Freely adapted from Longfellow's poem, the burlesque included such characters as a dancing heifer, an amorous whale, and the Lone Fisherman, who is forever looking for the sea with his telescope but who never utters a word. The burlesque began the careers of both Goodwin and Rice, later giving an important leg up to such later famous performers as Henry E. Dixey and Francis Wilson (both of whom played half of the heifer) and William H. Crane. Originally a Boston production, this most popular and enduring of American musical burlesques was played incessantly for the remainder of the century, although it produced no songs of note.

The Oxford Companion to American Theatre. Copyright © 2004 by Oxford University Press, Inc. All rights reserved.